Elcock Back to Crew?

Okay, not really, but now that Chicago's lineup features Mexican forward Cuahtemoc Blanco, I think the Crew should look into re-signing Elcock just to give him the heebie-jeebies.

Pathetic Suburbanites

On my biking blog, I recently addressed a Dispatch interview with Mark McCullers, the general manager of the Crew. He was talking about Crew Stadium and the need for improvements around it. I discussed the need for bike racks and a better cycling infrastructure, as it is a biking blog.

One of the comments I received was from a fellow who calls himself "Adrock", but left no contact information. And frankly, it pissed me off. Here's his first comment:

They would also have to relocate the stadium somewhere that is acceptable for most people to take their families to, especially if by bike.

I don't go to Crew games for the same reason I don't go to Clippers games or go shopping at City Center.

Once the new baseball stadium opens though, I'll probably be cruising down there on my bike all the time. I'd definitely go to soccer games too if the stadium weren't in such an awful location. I can't imagine what our international visitors must think of Columbus when they see it.

Huh? My answer:

What's wrong with the location of Crew Stadium? It's centrally located and easily accessible from both the expressway and surface streets. Plenty of families come to Crew games all the time - in fact, crowds seem to be made up mostly of families.

And he responded just now with this:

well, for me personally, it's not a place i'd choose to go unless i had to. i grew up in hilliard and live in grandview and have friends & family that live all around other suburbs. i can tell you that a good number of us suburban folk don't find the state fairgrounds or anywhere else in the majority of the city of columbus an appealing place to go visit.

sure, call me sheltered or ignorant or anything else, but that's the way it goes.

Okay. You're sheltered and ignorant - and a bit stuck up. First of all, most of the Crew's audience is suburban families. So you really can't say that "They would also have to relocate the stadium somewhere that is acceptable for most people to take their families to" - as it's obviously perfectly acceptable for most people to take their families to. I take my family there for almost every game. My friends all do the same. Just because YOUR little enclave won't go doesn't mean MOST people won't.

Second, your need to cling to the suburbs is cultural elitism of the very worst. You don't wish to see how anyone outside your little pre-fab environment lives, so you hide and partition yourself from the real world.

Third, you're a sprawlist of the worst sort - instead of visiting something, you insist that it be brought to you instead. So you're spoiled, on top of sheltered, ignorant, and stuck up.

Not taking advantage of the things your city has to offer because of the location is just sad. And it's people like this who are responsible for much of the environmental degradation we see today via the magic of sprawl.

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!

Reasons to be very scared... from an AP report:

Bush to Have Colonoscopy at Camp David
By DEB RIECHMANN
Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Bush will have a routine colonoscopy Saturday and temporarily hand presidential powers to Vice President Dick Cheney, the White House said.

That's it, we're done.

I'm Not An Addict, Baby. That's a Lie

68%How Addicted to Blogging Are You?

Mingle² - Online Dating

I Wish They All Could Be.... Vermont Senators?

Senator Patrick Leahy hits the nail right on the head. Time to start impeachment procedings against the Cheney/Bush government.

Must Have Been a Slow Night...

The Lies That Led To War

CBC's documentary show The Fifth Estate produced a program on the lies that led to the War in Iraq. It should be required viewing for all Americans, though it's pretty obvious that many won't watch it because it's not produced in the US.

This is 44 minutes long, but please watch it.

In the Garden of Eden

I love the Simpsons...

Apologize to World for Bush's Actions

President George Bush has made the USA the only country in the G8 nations that did NOT agree to a goal of preventing the rise of the average temperature of the world by 2 degrees Centigrade, stating that it was against our policies.

"The treatment of climate change runs counter to our overall position and crosses multiple 'red lines' in terms of what we simply cannot agree to... We have tried to 'tread lightly' but there is only so far we can go given our fundamental opposition to the German position."
- White House document; 5/14/2007

The president obviously doesn't speak for the majority of Americans, who in poll after poll say they want the government to address climate change as the hard science that it is, and do something to reduce it.

Friends of the Earth is sending a petition that basically states just that:

On behalf of the United States of America, I apologize for the actions of our president, George W. Bush. His rejection of global warming measures to be endorsed at the upcoming G8 meeting is shameful, and does not represent my views or those of the American people.

Please visit the link and sign this petition!

Bush Administration Wants To Let Beef Kill You

According to the International Herald Tribune, the Bush Administration is fighting to keep meatpackers from testing all their animals for Mad Cow Disease, which has killed 150 people worldwide (3 in the US thus far).

Read the article, but apparently Creekstone Farms Premium Beef, a Kansas company, wants to test all their cows regularly for the disease, a move that larger companies say will force them to do the same. So the Bush Administration appealed a federal court decision that denied the larger companies attempts to stop Creekstone from carrying out its new policy.

So let's sort this out: Creekstone wants to do the right thing and ensure that its product is fit to eat and won't kill the consumers. Larger companies want to stop Creekstone from doing this because they don't want to have to do it themselves. And the Bush Administration is helping the big companies get their way.

So, in essence, the Bush Administration wants to let the bigger companies kill their customers.

Nice, eh?

Campaign Ads on Television

I have a question for all of you out there, especially those from outside the United States. It concerns the prevalence of television advertisements for political office campaigns.

The question is: Do you have them? And do you feel that they affect your nations' influence by special interest groups?

Please respond in the comments on this post. This is not a scientific poll or anything like that, it's more just my own search for information.

26 Global Warming Myths Debunked

Britain's magazine New Scientist takes 26 different "reasons" to doubt global warming and debunks them. It's a good read, though a bit technical in parts.

My Rant About the Worst Anti-Science Excuse: "I Don't Believe In It"

A couple of scientific issues that are continually in the headlines these days are evolution and global climate change. And the thing that irks me continually is to see the people who come out publicly saying "I don't believe in" one or the other.

You know what? We don't have the luxury of not believing in these things, because they're not belief systems. They're science. And both of them are so strongly considered to be consensuses by the scientists that study them that they're can be considered fact.

Science is a process of researching, hypothesizing, experimentation, analysis, and then the same again, over and over. It's the fact-based, empirical search for truth. Scientific consensus is not a matter of opinion. If scientists say something works a certain way, and the theory has been tested and re-tested in numerous ways the way that both evolution and global warming have at this point, then it's truly folly to say you "don't believe in them."

When you hear pundits on the radio and elsewhere talk about how these things are matters of opinion because they have the tag "theory" on them, that's not valid questioning. A "theory" is a tested and verified hypothesis, which is an educated guess to begin with. So subjective evidence supports the claims of these theories. These pundits have a misunderstanding of what a theory actually is, and have attempted to spread that misunderstanding to the world through their "outrage."

Now, if you have an actual scientific reason, based on data, experimentation, and analysis, for questioning a theory, that's a whole different issue. That's the purpose of scientists reporting their data to peer-reviewed journals throughout their discipline - to invite more research and experimentation. It's part of the scientific method - the system of research, hypothesis, experimentation, and results reporting - that all reputable scientists use.

Such concepts as intelligent design and the like, which are proposed as "competing theories," are actually nothing of the sort. If you read them, they are philosophy at best - a "what if" scenario that doesn't have any experimentation to actually back it up. And what they strike me as is the last-gasp attempt of someone, who thinks his belief system is under attack by real evidence, to hold on to something that's given them comfort.

To Anyone Who Doubts That Cheney's Halliburton Is Crooked...

... you can stop wondering. Read this article and start calling your Representatives and Senators.

Moreno to Crew - So Long, Joseph Ngwenya

In a fairly big trade, the Crew grabbed forward Alejandro Moreno from Houston and traded Joseph Ngwenya to the Dynamos in return.

I'll be very honest, I've only seen Moreno play a couple times as I generally don't have time to watch non-Crew games on TV (I don't always have time to watch Crew games on TV, for that matter). But from what I've seen, he's a much cleaner player than Carlos Ruiz (not that that's too hard), who was rumored to be coming to Columbus. And he's a big, physical presence up front, a good holder of the ball, and he's scored a lot of goals in the rather limited number of games he's been in. He seems to have always been behind a top-notch scorer on the depth chart wherever he's been, so he's probably chomping at the bit to be the number one guy.

So I like this move. I liked Ngwenya, but have to admit I agree with those who say he was offside too much. He was starting much better this season, but the fact remains that we need a scoring punch, and with only one true forward on the roster (and a crappy one at that in Jason Garey) we needed to do something. And now we have.

Also interesting - our trades recently have been much more about skill than about "hustle," "pace," or being a good practice player. That was a curse we were under in the Fitz/Andrulis years. With Sigi Schmidt as the big kahuna on the bench, we're moving in a much more offensive, skill-based direction. I like it. We'll see how things pan out if we can ever get Moreno and Herron on the field simultaneously. I'm excited!